Since the first discovery of two separate hemispheres
connecting to form the human brain, competition between the dominance of the
right hemisphere to the left hemisphere has existed. Many believe that a
certain hemisphere determines or explains academic performance. Such a
statement is entirely false and as the textbook mentioned, “illogical is not
the same as creative.” Yes the right hemisphere may be dominant in recognizing
emotions in others and may be linked to more artistic characteristics and the
left hemisphere may be dominant for speech and more realistic logical thinking,
but that doesn’t completely determine a person’s entire personality or academic
abilities. Most actions require both hemispheres to cooperate and work
together. The corpus callosum is in charge of connecting both hemispheres and is
also important in the exchange of information. If the cooperation and unity of
both hemispheres is so important, what occurs when there is a lack of
connection?
Extensive research has been
conducted on people with underdeveloped or severed corpus callosums; the connecting
and unifying part of the brain. As seen in the following video with a patient
named Joe, much information has been found regarding split hemispheres. A
person with split hemispheres claims to feel nothing different, when comparing
their cognitive state before the damage was made to the corpus callosum. People with split hemispheres have
been described to be two people in one body. Both hemispheres function
independently with their side of the body in a split-brain person. In a normal human being one side of the brain is coordinated with the
opposite side of the body, since the human brain is contralateral.
It is amazing to witness the experiment conducted on patient
Joe. When a word was flashed to his right hemisphere, being the nonverbal
hemisphere, he couldn’t verbally express what the word was, but he could point
at the object with his left hand. It was until after he had pointed at the object
that he would then say the corresponding word. It is as if there were two
different people seeing two different things and not knowing what the other had
seen.
There have been cases where a split-brain individual is
interviewed and there seems to be two different personalities completely. There
may be a question in which the right hemisphere agrees with and where the left disagrees.
It is quite difficult to understand how someone could have two different
mentalities about one subject, but the oppositions are not always cognitive.
There have also been cases where people have difficulties doing activities that
involve hand synchrony. For example tying shoelaces or zipping up ones pants. Both
hands may struggle to work together. Split-brain individuals may look to be at a disadvantage, but it would be interesting to further research the positive aspects to having full control of each hemisphere individually. It may eventually stop being looked at as a burden, but be embraced as a special ability, which might prove to be helpful in the end.
I absolutely like the way you explained in detailed the material. It's amazing to see how the two hemispheres play a huge role in a human body’s brain. The way a person reacts when they have split-brain surgery is completely amazing, it’s like having to persons in one body, they see the world differently and adapt to their new life style as difficult as that may seem. Having this in mind, it must be very difficult for them to make decisions due to the inability of the brain to communicate information to the right or left hemisphere. In reality we need both hemispheres to function properly and to be able to send information to one another, to better understand any material that is to be given to us in dept. And yes it sounds scary having to deal with two personalities inside the same body, but like you mentioned it must be interesting to research more in detail the advantages to having two separate worlds within us.
ReplyDeleteI love the way you went into detail with this topic. I must just imagine how people with more than one personality have to adapt into their new life. Having to overcome all these obstacles may sometimes make the person better. But what happens when they can’t overcome these circumstances? Spilt-brain individuals that suffer from certain circumstances can adapt to their new lifestyle, but what happens to those that struggle to maintain a healthy life? What other choices do they have? Learning about this topic has made me more interesting in learning how our brain communicates with each hemisphere. Video was also helpful!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed this article very much. Although after reading the textbook, I understood mostly about the split brain phenomenon, a few of the details were still tricky to learn for me. The fact that an individual with split brain can visually see something in each field, however only be able to write down what they saw on the right side, and only point to that on the left, because we analyze these things with the opposite hemispheres can become somewhat confusing. Hopefully your idea of researching into the positive aspects of this will take place. These individuals are gifted with special abilities in "using" one hemisphere more when they need it, and maybe the realization of this can build into something greater for anybody with this.
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